June 10 Exams – Paper P3 was….. Post your comments here

@suejune7981 said:
hi: what about q1 part b and c ?

errmm I tailored the question against them 3 issues, said a lot of crap bout why ony 5% were being responded to, i.e already had membership cards at that pointm – dont send out till payment cleared, preventive action as in allowing customers to pay by DD then wouldnt need to send out so many letters, backlog causing delays, not intergrated system, cant think of any more offhand but wrote loads of small different points.

part c broke up into two sections, email then net. Talked about email reminders – not green to post letters so more enviromentaly friendly, mass marketing emails, promotion and donation begging emails lol, then reaching a wider target market worldwide, intergrated site to allow payments there and then, webcam’s to allow people to watch the wildlife without having to go to wetland and maybe destroy some wildlife when there! volunteer profiles to promte work done and increase morale (recgonision for what the members do) etc

hi , Faithe, thank you
i used value chain for part c. and some of them said 6I .

the paper is really time pressures. if we have bit more time , we could do better. hope the examiner himself will read this feedback and take it inot account.
good luck!

@faithe said:
errmm I tailored the question against them 3 issues, said a lot of crap bout why ony 5% were being responded to, i.e already had membership cards at that pointm – dont send out till payment cleared, preventive action as in allowing customers to pay by DD then wouldnt need to send out so many letters, backlog causing delays, not intergrated system, cant think of any more offhand but wrote loads of small different points.

part c broke up into two sections, email then net. Talked about email reminders – not green to post letters so more enviromentaly friendly, mass marketing emails, promotion and donation begging emails lol, then reaching a wider target market worldwide, intergrated site to allow payments there and then, webcam’s to allow people to watch the wildlife without having to go to wetland and maybe destroy some wildlife when there! volunteer profiles to promte work done and increase morale (recgonision for what the members do) etc

@faithe said:
errmm I tailored the question against them 3 issues, said a lot of crap bout why ony 5% were being responded to, i.e already had membership cards at that pointm – dont send out till payment cleared, preventive action as in allowing customers to pay by DD then wouldnt need to send out so many letters, backlog causing delays, not intergrated system, cant think of any more offhand but wrote loads of small different points.

part c broke up into two sections, email then net. Talked about email reminders – not green to post letters so more enviromentaly friendly, mass marketing emails, promotion and donation begging emails lol, then reaching a wider target market worldwide, intergrated site to allow payments there and then, webcam’s to allow people to watch the wildlife without having to go to wetland and maybe destroy some wildlife when there! volunteer profiles to promte work done and increase morale (recgonision for what the members do) etc

@suejune7981 said:
hi , Faithe, thank you
i used value chain for part c. and some of them said 6I .
the paper is really time pressures. if we have bit more time , we could do better. hope the examiner himself will read this feedback and take it inot account.
good luck!

I had it all in my head not sure if right or not, I just hope I managed to make some sense in it in what I actually wrote as didnt have time to review!
There is a section on ACCA’s website where you can take a survey for the exam which the exam board and marking teams are supposed to consider. I will see if I can post the link.
If you read the examiners comments on the past exam papers, even if you didnt use the model or any model, that he was expecting you to, you still get credit if your points are relevant to the case study!
Good luck to you too

I did PESTEL for the envoirnmental analysis of Q1 (a) and also did a bit of r+c=C for the strategic capabilities part but didn’t have time to answer the rest of the part a. I thought it was a lot to ask to add in stakeholders and (can’t remember other part of Q1a).
Overall though I thought the exam was fair in terms of topics asked but very long. My lecturer had predicted Q1 to involve PESTEL, SWOT or value chain and that Porter’s diamond and CMMI to appear somewhere.

Did anyone use the 6 I’s (Integration, interactivity, intelligence, etc) for Q1 (c) when asked about using the web and email? I set out my answer with those 6 I’s as headings and wrote 1 or 2 points on each e.g. can integrate renewal system with website for online renewals. I was quite happy with that answer but doesn’t seem like anyone else here mentioned they did that.

In my opinion,stage 3 exams should be more like what happens in real life..a business analyst wont be given 1 hr for that lengthy case….probably like 1 week!!..there shd be no ambiguities at this stage..

Q1 (a) environment (pestel), capabilities (9 m’s) , stakeholder (mendelowe ) and msiion
Q1 (b) Use swim-lanes to find faults and solutions#
Q1 (c) ^i’s of e-marketing

Q2 (a) ratio’s (financial), synergy , fit , culture (non-financial)
Q2 (b) Porters Diamond

Q3 (a) Benefits of outsourcing
Q3 (b) Competencies of BA’s – project mmgt ?
Q3 (c) CMMI and level 5 discussion

Had 20 mins to complete Q3 and thus rushed.handwriting suffered all the way through.
A crazy paper with long-winded scenerio’s written by an examiner who is a stickler for models/rules.
This paper should not be such a nightmare to pass – it is made so by the examiner.

Third attempt after two 48’s .
I feel I did well enough to pass but Mr Skidmore what’s it to be…?

Hi Fergie

I used some of the 6I’s = independence of loaction so can reach much wider audience an also inteligence.

Questions paper were too long, reading & planning time 15 minutes are not enough as compare with big scenarios and big big storeis in paper for 3hrs paper. i have writing speed problem and poor hand writing so, i could write enough where will be discursive question.

Qn 1a: I used PESTEL but got both the E mixed up (used environmental and emision. I totally remembered the wrong E). Mendelow matrix for stakeholders expectation. I listed members (Key Players), volunteers (keep informed), WWTFT (do nothing) and the government of Arcadia (Keep satisfied). Capabilities i used Finance, HR, equipment and intangibles (FHEI). Organisation mission: General
1b: General answering.
1c: Reach, richness and affliation. Wanted to include the 6 I but not enought time to do so.
2a: Ratio analysis. Financial measures.Only the GP margin and gearing is better than Swift. Non financial: Talk about Ashridge Portfolio (Heartland), BCG (Star), Ansoff (existing product but new market because of new country) and some general reasoning.
2b: Porter Diamond.
3a: Harmon Process Matrix (Outsource, therefore low strategic importance and high/low complexity) 6 general benefits listed.
3b: New/enhanced competence from Business Analyst (gave up due to lack of time)
3c: CMMI. Added balaced scorecard too. Reached optimisation (CMMI level 5) will improve learning and growth stage, which improves biz internal process, customer satisfaction which leads to improved financial performance for Pro-tech.
That’s how i answered my P3 for today. hope can score 50.

Completely ran out of time.

Spent too much time on question 1a, for the strengths and weaknesses – did a M model, oppportunities and threats – Pestel analysis. did a little on stakeholder mapping using Menlow matrix, and paragraph on Mission statements, this took too much time- it would have been better to use SWOT anaylsis instead.

by the time i got to part Q1b – i didnt even bother reading the question, on what i was suppose to do. had just written about BPR.

Q1c – cant really remember the question but i talked about customer relationshipment management.

buy now i only had 45minutes to do rest of the paper, which a had not read the senarios for. Did Q2 and Q3 completely rushed. In only spent 15mins on last. did write anything for Q3b.

must ask did anyone bother with question 4??

***** GUYS, please read this for your own good!

I see alot of you thought that the exam was really lengthy and we couldnt possibly have applied all our knowledge given the length of scenarios and the time available. Kindly visit

https://www.webropol.com/P.aspx?id=448095&cid=92084973

and post your comments and concerns there. If alot of students say the same thing, our voice will be heard and the time factor will surely be taken into account giving us an edge…..

i did part, now its you guys turn!!!!